Recap of May startup news from CEE: first Unicorn and Slovak Hyperloop buzz

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Estonian TransferWise became the first Eastern European Unicorn

The money transfer service, developed in Estonia, raised a $26M Series D round at a valuation of $1.1B, which makes them the 1st official Unicorn from Eastern Europe. More on TechCrunch.

Lithuanian FoodOut invested in Estonian MyChef

The Lithuanian delivery startup Foodout, backed by Goldfish Fund, invested in its Estonian counterpart Mychef to support its launch on the highly competitive Finnish market planned for this fall. The terms of the deal are not public. Details on ArcticStartup.

Slovak MultiplexDX is backed by Neulogy Ventures

MultiplexDX, a medtech startup from Slovakia, joined the portfolio of the Slovak Neulogy Ventures. The company develops accurate and affordable technology for diagnostics and treatment of tumors and cancer prevention. The solution is based on visualization technology that combines molecular biology and histopathological methods.

Slovak AgentBalance raised $500K from Neulogy Ventures (updated)

AgentBalance is another startup that joined Neulogy Ventures’portfolio. This a solution for contact centers and customer service companies, which introduces a set of psychological metrics to evaluate the profiles of agents and provide their managers with insights to boost agents’ productivity and involvement. AgentBalance is based on Conversation Analysis Method, which is a psychometric method taking into account individual psychological profiles of every single tested subject – the contact center agent in this case, and is able to provide an objective insight into a person’s mind.

In the near future, the solution will include speech analysis, emotion detection and biometrics. The funds will be used to extend global sales and marketing efforts and build a research and development center in Kosice, Slovakia.

Slovaks to play a big role in Hyperloop project (updated)

Hyperloop Transportation Technologies (HTT), a rival of Hyperloop One co-founded by Shervin Pishevar, a venture capitalist with strong connections to Elon Musk, developed Vibranium, the new ultra-safe material for their transporting capsules, together with the C2i. This is a Slovak manufacturer of carbon fiber for the automotive and aircraft industries. The new material is 10 times stronger than still and is packed with sensors which transmit in real-time the data on temperature, stability, integrity and other parameters.

Earlier in March Dirk Ahlborn, CEO of HTT, agreed with the Slovak government to investigate the possibility of building a Hyperloop connecting Bratislava to Vienna and Budapest.

Hungarian Startup worth looking at

Auto-grouping of similar shots by Picturesqe.

In May, TechCrunch covered the Hungarian startup Picturesqe without a VISIBLE reason (i.e. a hefty funding round), which is a good reason itself to mention it in our May recap. The team develops a tool that uses AI to help professional and semi-professional photographers to automate the selection of good shots and toss the rest. Picturesqe’s features include grouping similar photos, smart zooming that allows comparing the same spots on several pictures, option to automatically delete low-quality snaps.

Polish Brainly raised $15M from Naspers

The Polish startup Brainly, founded in 2009 by Michal Borkowski and dubbed “Quora for students” by BusinessIndider, snags $15M in Series A from Naspers. The peer-to-peer learning and Q&A social network targets students who help each other to crack homework questions in maths and in other subjects.

Brainly already can boast 60M users, 87% of which use the service at least once a month. The money will be used to grow in the US and implement machine-learning algorithms to introduce personalization features into the platform. More on BusinessInsider.

Polish Perfect Gym gets $1M

Perfect Gym Solution, an ERP system for fitness clubs, raised $1M from the VC fund Innovation Nest and Polish venture builder company DaftCode. The two-year-old startup has over 250 customers in 16 countries.

Based on a Deloitte’s report of the fitness industry, the European market is worth €27B, and the number of fitness club members will grow from 50M today to 80M within ten years. The funding will be used to capitalize on this trend and spearhead customer acquisition. Details here.

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Vita Radkevitch-Turlo

Prior to joining GoalEurope Vita has been working in the IT outsourcing industry in a number of marketing and PR roles. Before that, Vita studied in the US at Bard College and worked in South Korea at SK Securities and the European Union Chamber of Commerce. Speaks fluent Russian, English and French.